Plants and flowers are a welcome addition to any décor. Their vibrant colors combined with their unique physical traits and pleasant aromas often form the centerpiece of a home or garden. As with most living things, plants and flowers require attentive care for them to achieve their full potential. This of course includes many tasks, such as pruning, feeding and watering. One (1) additional common task is the manual rotation of the plant on a daily basis to prevent the plant from becoming permanently skewed due to growing towards the light. This movement of plants toward the light is called phototropism and is especially prevalent in plants that only have sunlight available from a single window on the interior of a dwelling. Phototropism is the result of a plant hormone that botanists have named auxin. Auxin is present in all green plants and has the peculiar characteristic of always moving away from the lighted side to cells on the shaded side of the plant. High concentrations of auxin cause stem cells to grow more rapidly and elongate and its absence causes cells to grow more slowly and shorten. This causes a stem to grow unevenly, the side away from the light grows more rapidly than the side toward the light and as a result, the stem begins to bend. As the stem bends, the plant curves toward the light. Since the sun regulates the schedule of plant growth, even if the plants are rotated on a daily basis, they can still have a skewed look and achieve an unhealthy growth pattern.
Various attempts have been made in the past to overcome this problem and provide turntables and other rotating display platforms for plants and flowers. These attempts can be seen by reference to the following U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,885,117, issued in the name of Lemert, which describes a revolving plant rack; 3,360,885, issued in the name of St. Clair, which describes a potted plant rotator; 4,969,290, issued in the name of Skoretz, which describes an apparatus for even exposure of plants to sunlight; and 6,128,854, issued in the name of Chaney, which describes a potted plant turntable. Other attempts to provide rotating display platforms and care for potted plants include U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,479,618; 4,026,067; 4,051,627; 4,227,343; 5,152,099; 6,230,440; and 6,604,321.
Additionally, ornamental designs for rotatable plant stands exist, particularly, U.S. Pat. No. D 479,776. However, none of these designs are similar to the present invention.
While these devices fulfill their respective, particular objectives, each of these references suffers from one (1) or more of the deficiencies and disadvantages by failing to provide a practical and efficient means of automatically rotating a potted plant which doesn't require regular attention and maintenance to be effective. Accordingly, there exists a need for a means by which house plants can be rotated on a continual basis to eliminate the tendency to grow towards the light. The development of the present invention substantially departs from the conventional solutions and in doing so fulfills this need.